Abandon All Hope: Through the Gates of Hell with Dante and Rodin

“Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here.” Not exactly the welcome one might expect when arriving at a Parisien public institution. And yet, this terrifying phrase provided the creative spark for August Rodin’s spectacular creation, The Gates of Hell, slated for the façade of a new museum. Initially inspired by Dante’s Inferno and enhanced by later artistic and written descriptions of “Hellfire and brimstone,” Rodin poured his creative spirit into a project that would last twenty years. Hundreds of changes followed year after year as a final version took shape. The result was unlike anything the world had ever seen. Sadly, Rodin would never see it cast in bronze, much less installed as a museum portal. Its story is one of art history’s most frustrating tales where one man’s genius runs headlong into mind-numbing bureaucracy.

Beginning with Dante’s Inferno, this lecture will usher the audience pictorially through the bowels of Hell where eternal torment awaits. When ultimately arriving at the foot of Rodin’s majestic gates, exhilaration replaces all sense of dread. Come for the torment, stay for the bliss.

Dr. Arbitman received both an MA and Ph.D. in art history from the University of Pittsburgh with a specialization in seventeenth-century Dutch art. After serving as the first curator-in-charge of The Frick Art Museum in 1985, she went on to become the director of the Palmer Museum of Art at Penn State University and the Executive Director of the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens in Florida.